Columns

I attended a Sunday service a few weeks ago at the Rockbridge Baptist Church out around Willisburg. The pastor, Terry McIlvoy, at one point made an appeal for donations to a local nonprofit called the House of Hope.

Last Sunday, I was at the St. Rose Catholic Church and Father McGrath made an appeal for the House of Hope. In fact, several different churches, of different denominations, around the county have made appeals for money for the House of Hope.

There’s one invention from the 20th century that has influenced more history than any other. It’s television. Hey kids, if your grandparents and great grandparents give you the devil about your cell phones and the internet then you remind them of what old Ken Begley said about them concerning televisions in this article. They were as addicted to televisions as you are to these new confounded electronics we have all about us now.

My wife, Lori, and I are not good with houseplants. When she brings home a new plant, I shake my head, knowing the plant’s likely demise. I want to pull it aside and whisper, “I’m so sorry she bought you. I promise I’ll pray for you.”

If plants could muster a police force, they would charge Lori and me with negligent homicide.

So last year, when some well-meaning friends gave us an amaryllis for Christmas, I thanked them kindly.

I’m the first one to admit the world is ever changing, and that people, along with all of the other creatures on the earth, are slowly evolving. Sometimes, however, changes aren’t always for the best, and the traits we inherit may actually harm us in the end.

About three years ago, a high school teacher by the name of David McCullough at Wellesley (Massachusetts) High School gave the commencement address at that school. His address attracted a great deal of attention. His message to the graduates was, in essence, that they were not special. I think, more accurately, what he was attempting to convey to the graduates was that they should not have assumed they were special. He gave many statistics to prove his point.

It has been my experience that the folks who do the best in life are those who spot opportunity and act on it.

These people are not any smarter than the rest of us. But they take action when the fire is hot and make a commitment while the rest of us don‘t.

It’s also been my experience in life that you don’t want to be those folks who 20 years after the fact say “I should have, I could have, I would have” when successful people accomplish something you wish you did.

A friend and gardening mentor told me when I first ventured into this labor of love called gardening that this hobby should be relaxing. “If it’s stressful,” he told me, “you’re taking it too seriously.”

His words echo in my ears as I stare at the freshly plowed ground, that chore the courtesy of a friend kind enough to break up the soil for me.

It happens every year: “Can I do this? Do I really want to start with the planting, the cultivating, the weeding?”

In journalism, if you need a source for a story, you talk to someone who has a point of view to share for your story. You do that regardless of the person’s background, and particularly regardless of their race.

Usually, I find myself on the side of the news story where I’m the one asking the questions. Rarely have I been the one interviewed. But Monday morning, I received a telephone call that placed me as a source for a story to be aired on television.